


Trading Up

by derryderrydown



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-11-17
Updated: 2009-11-17
Packaged: 2017-10-03 04:17:22
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,207
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14097
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/derryderrydown/pseuds/derryderrydown
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Written for the Asylum challenge for the prompt 'Fic about Kat. After the guys have left. (Bonus points if there's some sort of supernatural occurrence involved).'</p>
            </blockquote>





	Trading Up

Kat wasn't dumb. When Dean had told her to stay out of haunted houses, she'd known he was talking sense and decided she was going to live her life by that tenet.

No more spooky houses for her, thank you very much. She had soccer practice and college applications and that truly horrific biology final and ghosts _did not_ fit into her life.

Trouble was, Tad was a pretty good boyfriend. (_Way_ better than Gavin. Which wasn't difficult, because a bar of Hershey's was a better boyfriend than Gavin.) And Tad and his friends liked spending their evenings in empty houses, where they could make noise and maybe drink a bit and not, Tad assured her, do any serious damage.

And Tad and his stupid, dumb, moronic, _imbecilic_ friends had decided to spent _this_ evening in the old McMahon place. The one that hadn't been lived in since before Kat was born; the one that nobody went anywhere near after dark.

The one that was only slightly less spooky than the asylum.

Of course, all the others had gotten out okay. Even _Geoffrey_ had gotten out, and he could barely run fifty yards without falling over his own legs, but Tad was left behind. And, because they were Tad's friends and therefore _vaguely_ decent human beings, they'd gone looking for help.

They'd gone to Gavin first, because the rumours circulating about the stuff at the asylum all cast Gavin as the hero. (Like Kat needed any more proof that Gavin had been the one to start the stories.) And Gavin had, apparently, turned white, told them to speak to Kat and then slammed his door in their faces.

And now Kat had her dad's shotgun, loaded with rocksalt, and was climbing in the window of the old McMahon place. The crucifix in her bag was, she was willing to admit, probably due to watching too much Buffy, but the lighter fluid, salt and matches were because of Sam and Dean. (And, man, she wished they were here. Especially Sam. _Especially_ Sam.)

So. First things first. She flicked on her flashlight and looked around the room she was in. A kitchen. Sink, old fridge, formica-topped table, hole where there should probably have been an oven. Nothing particularly spooky.

Well, nothing spookier than you'd expect from a dark, abandoned house lit only by a wavering flashlight. So, kinda spooky.

She cleared her throat and it seemed way too loud. "Tad?" she called. And then, again, louder, "Tad!"

There was a noise from upstairs.

"Tad?"

The noise again, sounding more desperate. If a muffled scrape-thump could be said to be desperate.

Kat took a deep breath, made sure she had a good grip on the shotgun, and made for the door.

The stairs were on her right. Or, well, the _remains_ of the stairs. Still, Tad had managed to get up there, so she probably could, too. "Tad? Thump twice if you're in danger!"

Thump. Thump-crash.

Oh, great.

"And twice again if it's a ghost."

Thud-wallop. Scrape-bang.

Well, he _might_ have just got his foot trapped in rotting floorboards or something. If, y'know, Kat's life had been _normal_.

"I'm coming to get you," she called up the stairs. "And whatever's causing trouble should get out the way because I know how to deal with it. I've been _trained_."

She was careful to step on the joists of the stairs, rather than relying on crumbling floorboards, and she kept the flashlight moving between her feet and the stairs ahead of her and whatever might be waiting at the top of the stairs. Finally, she was on the second floor and there were four doors facing her.

"Tad?"

"In here." It was more of a gasp than a call, muffled and choked, and Kat paused.

"Is that you, Tad?"

"_Yes!_"

Kat narrowed her eyes. "What colour dress did I wear to the spring formal?"

"_I_ don't know!"

Kat swung the shotgun up.

"But - your bra! Your bra was blue and it had little pink flowers on it!"

Yeah. Maybe Tad wasn't actually a great improvement on Gavin.

"I'm coming in," Kat called, "and I've got a gun. A gun that works on ghosts, so you should get out of there and maybe I won't burn your bones. Okay?"

"It's still here," Tad said. "And it's getting closer and _fucking get in here and save me!_"

She really sucked at choosing boyfriends. But he was still human - just about - so she couldn't really leave him to be killed by whatever ghost was in there. She'd done this before - if you counted shooting Dean - so she could do it again. Right.

She kicked the door open, swung the flashlight and-

It was a little girl.

Still a ghost, true, but just a little girl, couldn't be older than six, with blonde curls and a gingham dress, holding a jump rope and smiling shyly at Kat.

Kat smiled back. "Hey there, sweetheart." Because, really, not all ghosts were bad. There'd only been one bad one in the asylum - the others had been trying to stop it and had never actually _hurt_ anybody. "Are you lonely?"

"It was trying to kill me!" Tad said, but Kat ignored him.

"Want to play," the ghost said, her voice wavering and flickering as much as she was.

"I'm sure you do," Kat said. "But Tad can't play any more. He has to go home." She crouched down. "I tell you what, I'll come back and play with you tomorrow, okay?"

"No," the ghost said. "Want to play _now_." And her smile wasn't exactly shy any more. In fact, it was kind of cruel, and she was suddenly right in front of Kat and the jump rope was around Kat's neck. "Gonna play _hangman_."

Kat didn't remember aiming her shotgun but the blast was loud enough to shock her back to reality as the ghost evaporated.

"I _told_ you I was in danger," Tad said, but he was scrambling to his feet as he spoke.

"Get out," Kat said, and he didn't stop to argue. Kat gave a last glance around and followed him. Fast.

In Tad's car, on the way home, he said, "So, I guess I shouldn't talk about this?"

Kat tapped her fingers on her thigh as she thought. "Actually, talk about it as much as you want. Play up the ghost. Make it really scary."

He looked at her. "Huh?"

"I've got my reasons," Kat said, and left it at that. Because she couldn't really explain that Sam and Dean might show up again to take care of it permanently. And she might be able to persuade them to teach her more about how to kill ghosts, which was looking to be something it'd be handy to know.

* * *

It was months before anybody showed up to ask about the old McMahon place. Kat was home from UW-Madison on spring break and had gone skeet-shooting with her dad when she was interrupted by a blonde girl, about her own height but maybe a year or two older.

"I hear you dealt with a ghost," the girl said.

"Temporarily," Kat said.

"I'm here to make sure it doesn't come back." The girl held out her hand. "I'm Jo."


End file.
